Comments on: The smooth mediocrity and squalid contentment of the times http://dancollier.org/2008/06/11/the-smooth-mediocrity-and-squalid-contentment-of-the-times/ nothing for the christmas tree Thu, 30 Jun 2011 12:20:34 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.2 By: JC http://dancollier.org/2008/06/11/the-smooth-mediocrity-and-squalid-contentment-of-the-times/comment-page-1/#comment-115 JC Fri, 13 Jun 2008 07:52:53 +0000 http://dancollier.org/?p=394#comment-115 The past and present wilt—I have fill’d them, emptied them, And proceed to fill my next fold of the future. Listener up there! Here, you! What have you to confide to me? Look in my face, while I snuff the sidle of evening; Talk honestly—no one else hears you, and I stay only a minute longer. Do I contradict myself? Very well, then, I contradict myself; (I am large—I contain multitudes.) I concentrate toward them that are nigh—I wait on the door-slab. Who has done his day’s work? Who will soonest be through with his supper? Who wishes to walk with me? Will you speak before I am gone? Will you prove already too late? --Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (1900) The past and present wilt—I have fill’d them, emptied them,
And proceed to fill my next fold of the future.

Listener up there! Here, you! What have you to confide to me?
Look in my face, while I snuff the sidle of evening;
Talk honestly—no one else hears you, and I stay only a minute longer.

Do I contradict myself?
Very well, then, I contradict myself;
(I am large—I contain multitudes.)

I concentrate toward them that are nigh—I wait on the door-slab.

Who has done his day’s work? Who will soonest be through with his supper?
Who wishes to walk with me?

Will you speak before I am gone? Will you prove already too late?

–Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (1900)

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